The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1887-06-08

one was bad Indian. He was killed 8
year ago during the summers trade The
Piegans were drunk and that devil had
made trouble. When the Indians got
sober they discovered that he was among
the killed" The trader looked across
the river toward the fort for an instant
ana added, inquiringly: "Quite long
shot from the west bastion, ehg' and he
again spat on the corpse.
up in British America, | knew an In.
dian trader called Liver Eating johnson
who derived his queer name from the
performance of the cannibal act oil
roasting and eating the liver of an enemy
who had stolen his saddle horse, and
whom he pursued and killed. Johnson
loaded two wagons with whiskey at Fort
Benton, "a placein those days wholly given
over to the devil, and drove north. On
the upper Belly river he found suitable
place on which to build fort. He
buried his whiskey barrels and began to
build log fort around his cache. When
the fort was two logs high, the warriors
OF the Blood clan of the Blackfeet, led
by war chief named Bull Back Fat.
galloped to the unfinished fort to talk
with the traders. The braves dis
mounted and with rifles in their hands,
crowded into the space inclosed by the
wall logs. They demanded that johnson
trade whiskey for buffalo robes. 1t
would have been almost certainideath to
have traded, so Johnson solemnly swore
that he had no whiskey that his wagons
had been loaded with blankets, dry
goods, provisions, and materials with
which TO build the fort The Indians
knew that he lied. They squatted on
the ground, wrapped their blankets
around them, then drawing the joints of
thelr Tamrods out of the butts of their
Winchester rifles, they screwed them to-
gether and drilled the ground to find the
whiskey barrels. Presently brave tel
egraphed to Bull Back Fat that he had
found the whiskey. The Indians rose to
their feet and gathered around their
chief, who faced Johnson and said:
1--WE must 20. The buffalo are wait
ing for us. When your house is finished
and you are ready TO trade we will re-
turn" and he added, inquiringly, ssYou
have no whiskey ?"
Not drop" johnson replied.
"Then," said the chief, as his blanket
fell from his shoulders and his cooked
rifle came to the carry, "this whiskey,"
stamping his foot on the ground to indi-
cate its position, (which is buried in my
ground is mine and my warriors and I
will drink it,"
They promptly dug II up and tapped a
barrel. The traders hitched up their
horses instantly and left the Belly river
before the Indians got drunk. johnson
swore that he would have revenge.
When he arrived at Fort Benton he
found a steamer, a floating pest house,
on which smallpox had travelled from
st. Louis up the Missouri river, tied
up at the river bank His vengeance lay
to his hand He bought the blankets
that had been used by the diseased pas
sengers, tied hem on two pack animals,
mounted his saddle-horse, and driving
his pack animals before him re-entered
the land of the Blackfeet, as though
trying to trade on small scale. He de-
liberately distributed those death-dealing
blankets among the camps of that nation
Three thousand Blackfeet were swept
into their graves by that fiendish act
AS long as the grazing ground of the
Northern herd Of buffalo, which stretched
from the Yellowstone to the plains lying
beyond the Saskatchewan, was compar-
atively inaccessible to the white hunters,
the business of trading whiskey to
Indians, though horribly degrading, did
not impoverish the tribes The traders
refused to trade for anything excepting